LibGuides: Physics and Astronomy: Articles

Evaluating sources -- Peer review

Peer review means the article has been reviewed by several researchers who are familiar with the topic. Most articles that are not rejected have been required to make at least some changes before publication. Relying heavily on peer-reviewed journal articles is a standard way of getting better quality information in academic research.
Even with peer review, journal articles should be read critically. They’re never perfect and can be wrong in details or even as a whole.
Look for methodology sections of articles you’re scanning. You can also search on names of methods or instruments, in addition to subject terms.

TYPES OF ARTICLES

Primary Article (original research)
Reports the findings from researchers. The experiments scientists conduct will be reported in this type of article.

Review Article (secondary literature)
This type of article will summarize the research that has been reported in primary literature.

Interested in Physics journals? Not just the articles within them?

What journals should you be looking at? Which are most influential or prestigious? (Be skeptical of rankings though.)

Look at Scimago, Google Scholar, or Eigenfactor. We no longer subscribe to Journal Citation Reports. Many top journals show their impact factors on their splash page.

Also, and maybe better, do a few broad searches on your topic and take a closer look at the journals that come up among the results.

Video -- Accessing an electronic journal

Physics and Astronomy Article Databases

Search Databases to Find Articles

Web of Science (ISI) This link opens in a new window
Provides indexing for over 12,000 academic journals, proceedings of international conferences, symposia, seminars, colloquia, workshops, and conventions, from three databases:
Science Citation Index, 1899-
Social Sciences Citation Index, 1898-
Arts & Humanities Citation Index, 1975-
Web of Science also offers a true cited reference index, which allow you to trace particular research forward in time or backward in time to see how works grow and develop in a focused area of research.
Google Scholar This link opens in a new window

You should be able to find find articles from Physical Review, Scitation, Science Direct, IEEE, and other publishers by using Web of Science and Google Scholar and then linking to full text.

If you want to browse Physics and Astronomy journals, try these below. We will not necessarily have full text for all. And this will not include many physics journals in multidisciplinary packages.

Physical Review and PROLA (Physical Review Online Archive)
Indexes all American Physical Society's (APS) journal material published from 1893 up to current issues.

Scitation This link opens in a new window
Spring 2023 -- We're about to regain full access to AIP journals.
Provides access to nearly 300 peer-reviewed journals, thousands of conference proceedings and transactions, as well as ebooks, standards, patents, and seminars.

Covers physics, chemistry geosciences, engineering, acoustics, and other science and technology content.

Coverage: 1990s-

IEEE Xplore
About 200 journals. This does not include access to conference proceedings, ebooks, and other. Just journals.
SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)
The major source for information in astronomy, astrophysics, and physics. ADS searches three databases: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Physics, and arXiv e-prints. The databases cover journals, conference proceedings, many Observatory reports and newsletters, many NASA reports, and PhD theses. Also includes full-text scans of astronomical literature which can be browsed through the browse interface.
arXiv.org
Not necessarily peer-reviewed versions. Searchable archive for preprints in the fields of physics, mathematics, and computer science since 1991. Maintained by Cornell University.

More Databases

ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window
ScienceDirect is only one publisher. It is a BIG one, so it is often a worthwhile place to search.
Full text access to more than 1,200 journals from the Elsevier Science journal collection. Coverage of academic journals in the following areas: Biochemistry; Biological Sciences; Earth Sciences; Economics; Energy; Engineering & Technology; Environmental Science; Materials Science; Microbiology & Immunology; Neurosciences; Nursing and Health Professions; Physics and Astronomy; Sustainability and much more.
Coverage: 1960s-present
SciFinder Scholar This link opens in a new window
Go to this page for "New user registration. "https://library.appstate.edu/find-resources/databases/scifinder-scholar
SciFinder Scholar provides citations with abstracts from more than 10,000 journals as well as patents, conference proceedings, government research reports, books and dissertations. In addition, researchers have access to the CAS Registry of organic and inorganic substances, CASREACT for chemical synthesis information, and regulated chemical information in CHEMLIST.

Covers all areas of chemistry, including organic, inorganic, biochemistry, applied chemistry, and chemical engineering.

Coverage: 1840's-present

Atomic Spectra Database
This free database contains "critically evaluated NIST data for radiative transitions and energy levels in atoms and atomic ions. Data are included for observed transitions of 99 elements and energy levels of 57 elements. ASD contains data on about 950 spectra from about 0.4 Å to 500 µm, with about 75,000 energy levels and 110,000 lines, 44,000 of which have transition probabilities."
CDS - CERN Document Server
Covers preprints, articles, books, proceedings, presentations, talks, journals, reports, multimedia and outreach in particle physics. Many of the documents are full-text.
Energy Citation Databases (ECD)
ECD includes over 140,000 full text documents on chemistry, physics, engineering, climatalogy, and mathematics. Citations and documents are made publicly available by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
SPIRES-HEP
Run by the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center(SLAC) since the late 1960's as a database of particle physics literature.
Science Conference Proceedings Portal (U.S. Department of Energy)
This is a free distributed portal that provides access to science and technology conference proceedings and papers from nineteen professional societies plus a number of national labs. Also included are over 500,000 proceedings and papers indexed in the Energy Citations Database covering 1948 to the present. Proceedings and papers from scientific meetings can be found in these fields, among others: particle physics, nuclear physics, chemistry, petroleum, aeronautics and astronautics, meteorolog

ACM Digital Library This link opens in a new window
Coverage of information science, information technology, and computer science.
Full text access to more than 100 ACM journals, indexing to over 1,000 journals from other academic publishers, conference proceedings, and ACM Transactions.

Coverage: 1967-present

Library Guides

Physics and Astronomy: Articles

Science Librarian